Computational scientist Shantenu Jha has been named the inaugural chair of the Center for Data-Driven Discovery (C3D) at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, effective October 1. Part of the Computational Science Initiative (CSI), C3D is driving the integration of domain, computational, and data science expertise across Brookhaven Lab’s science programs and facilities, with the goal of accelerating and expanding scientific discovery. Outside the Lab, C3D is serving as a focal point for the recruitment of future data scientists and collaboration with other institutions.

Jha holds a joint appointment with Rutgers University, where he is an associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and principal investigator of the Research in Advanced Distributed Cyberinfrastructure and Applications Laboratory (RADICAL). He also leads a project called RADICAL-Cybertools, which are a suite of building blocks enabling the middleware (software layer between the computing platform and application programs) that supports large-scale science and engineering applications.